What Does an Accountant Do? Duties, Deliverables, and Hiring Fit

An accountant turns business records into measured, classified, reviewed, and explained financial information. Depending on the role, the work can include adjustments, reconciliations, close, statements, tax coordination, controls, analysis, and supervision. The title alone does not define the scope.

A small-business accountant may perform hands-on bookkeeping. A senior accountant may own complex schedules. A controller may lead the close and team. A CPA may provide tax or assurance services under separate terms. Define the actual deliverables and authority before hiring.

Accountant versus bookkeeper

Area	Bookkeeping emphasis	Accounting emphasis
Transactions	Capture and code	Review classification and measurement
Reconciliation	Prepare recurring reconciliations	Resolve complex differences and review
Close	Complete assigned tasks	Prepare adjustments and accept schedules
Statements	Run standard reports	Evaluate presentation and explain changes
Tax	Assemble records	Prepare workpapers or returns if qualified

Roles overlap in small teams. Use the detailed bookkeeping versus accounting guide and preserve independent review for payments, sensitive changes, and material entries where practical.

Monthly accounting duties

• Review source completeness, period cutoff, and unresolved bookkeeping exceptions.
• Reconcile cash, cards, processors, receivables, payables, payroll, debt, fixed assets, taxes, and equity.
• Prepare or review accruals, deferrals, depreciation, allocations, corrections, and recurring entries.
• Tie subledgers and operational systems to control accounts.
• Prepare the balance sheet, income statement, cash-flow view, and supporting schedules.
• Explain material changes and document uncertainties or estimates.

The SEC describes the balance sheet, income statement, cash-flow statement, and statement of equity as the main financial statements. A private company’s package may be simpler, but reported amounts should still trace to accepted records.

Adjusting entries and estimates

Accountants determine whether activity belongs in the period and classification shown. Common work includes accrued expenses, prepaid expenses, deferred revenue, bad-debt estimates, depreciation, payroll liabilities, interest, inventory, tax accruals, foreign currency, and intercompany activity.

Every material entry should have a purpose, source, calculation, preparer, approver, date, and period. Estimates should state the method, evidence, uncertainty, and later true-up process. Do not post a plug merely to force agreement.

Financial-statement preparation and analysis

An accountant reviews whether statements use consistent accounts, periods, entities, currencies, and accounting basis. The balance sheet should reconcile. The income statement should reflect supported classification and cutoff. Cash reporting should distinguish operations, investing, financing, and noncash items as applicable.

Analysis compares results with prior periods, budget, forecast, and operating drivers. The accountant should distinguish observation from cause. A margin change may reflect price, volume, mix, labor, vendor cost, cutoff, or coding.

Tax coordination

Accounting work can support income-tax returns, sales tax, payroll tax, information returns, estimates, fixed assets, owner schedules, and notices. Scope varies. Some accountants prepare returns; others only provide workpapers to a tax professional. Confirm credentials, jurisdictions, filings, advice, representation, and exclusions.

The business should maintain a calendar with preparer, reviewer, due date, payment authority, confirmation, and notice response. Reconcile filed amounts and payments to the ledger.

Controls and systems

An accountant can design the chart of accounts, close calendar, approval thresholds, reconciliation standards, journal workflow, report definitions, and access roles. During a software implementation, accounting expertise helps map processes and validate opening balances, transactions, and reports.

Named users, multifactor authentication, least privilege, vendor-change verification, payment separation, period control, and audit history reduce risk. A financial controller may own these activities when scale requires continuing senior oversight.

What an accountant may not do

Do not assume every accountant provides bookkeeping, tax returns, audits, legal advice, investment advice, payroll processing, valuation, forensic work, or CFO strategy. These services require different experience, licensing, independence, and engagement terms.

An accountant also cannot create reliable statements from incomplete records without assumptions and limitations. Management must provide complete facts, approve judgments, and accept responsibility for decisions.

How to hire the right accountant

1. Define the entities, periods, systems, accounting basis, tax footprint, and problem.
2. List recurring deliverables, deadlines, meetings, and acceptance criteria.
3. Assign who prepares, approves, pays, files, reconciles, reviews, and communicates.
4. Verify relevant industry, system, reporting, tax, and team experience.
5. Review security, access, confidentiality, records, coverage, and offboarding.
6. Confirm pricing assumptions, exclusions, out-of-scope rates, and change control.

Ask a candidate to explain a difficult reconciliation, a material adjustment, a late close, and an uncertain estimate. Clear reasoning and documentation matter as much as familiarity with software.

In-house, firm, or fractional support

An in-house accountant offers daily context and supervision but requires recruiting, management, coverage, and systems. A firm may provide flexible capacity and specialists but needs disciplined communication. Fractional senior support may review an internal or outsourced bookkeeping team.

Measure the arrangement by close time, reconciliations, recurring errors, open exceptions, post-close adjustments, reporting usefulness, control completion, and response. Avoid choosing only by hourly rate or job title.

First-month expectations

The accountant should inventory records, systems, users, balances, deadlines, policies, and known exceptions. High-risk accounts should be reconciled first. The team should agree on the close calendar, request list, communication route, materiality, and reporting package.

Opening work may reveal cleanup. Separate historical remediation from the recurring scope and document which balances are accepted. Reliable financial reporting requires a controlled foundation.

How accountants support business decisions

An accountant can explain how a proposed decision may affect reported revenue, expense timing, assets, liabilities, equity, and cash presentation. The accountant may also identify missing information, inconsistent classifications, unusual trends, and the records needed for tax or lender work. This analysis helps management understand the accounting consequence without transferring the business decision itself.

For example, before a large equipment purchase, the accountant can organize the invoice, financing terms, useful-life estimate, payment schedule, and account treatment. Management and qualified advisers still decide whether to buy, how to finance it, and which tax elections apply.

What makes an accountant’s work reviewable

Each material adjustment should have a description, period, accounts, amount, source, calculation, preparer, reviewer, and approval. Reconciliations should identify the ledger balance, independent or supporting balance, reconciling items, owner, and resolution date. Financial reports should state the basis, period, comparison, and material limitations.

Reviewability protects both the business and the accountant. It allows another qualified person to reproduce the conclusion, supports continuity during staff changes, and makes unresolved questions visible before tax filings, financing, or a transaction.

Questions the business should answer first

Before contacting candidates, identify which entities and periods are in scope, when the books were last reconciled, which filings are current, what systems hold the records, and which decisions depend on the work. Provide examples of the current reports and the problems management cannot resolve.

A clear problem statement helps distinguish recurring accounting, cleanup, controller oversight, tax preparation, and advisory needs. It also makes proposals easier to compare because each provider is responding to the same expected outcome.